An incorrigible Cognitive Dissident

It’s any old irony at the Daily Wail

There’s a corker of a letter in today’s Dacre Mail. Get your hankies at the ready….

Now up to here, I’m bound to say that I was with this bloke pretty well all the way up to the death wish thing. But then, sadly, he let himself down a bit….

Oh dear.

The Daily Mail is another of those things like the Labour Party, The Guardian, and religion: most people are not attracted to them, but one instinctively knows that society needs something in their place.

The anti terror laws introduced over the last decade have nothing to do with brown people and suicide bombings and everything to do with controlling the population of this country, and giving the government power through the compliant police force to do their dirty work. if you are anti anything then your deemed a terrorist and treated as such.

Is it any surprise that Britain has dropped nine places to 28th, behind ex-Soviet bloc states Poland, Estonia and Slovakia, in the international Freedom of Speech league table?

So when the police get matters so far out of proportion, we are entitled to ask: Who polices the police?

Why should questions about police procedures be handled solely by the so-called Independent Police Complaints Commission, which is notoriously reluctant to rule against police?

This inquiry has even begun to disturb those of our critics who have been at least partly responsible for what many see as a “witch-hunt”.

The Guardian has raised questions about freedom of the Press. Its media analyst, Steve Hewlett, says that when it comes to paying for stories, no newspaper — “tabloid or otherwise” — is exempt.

Yet in a quite extraordinary assumption of power, police are able to impose conditions not unlike those applied to suspected terrorists.

Under the draconian terms of police bail, many journalists are barred from speaking to each other. They are treated like threats to national security. And there is no end in sight to their ordeal.

Their alleged crimes? To act as journalists have acted on all newspapers through the ages, unearthing stories that shape our lives, often obstructed by those who prefer to operate behind closed doors.

These stories sometimes involve whistleblowers. Sometimes money changes hands. This has been standard procedure as long as newspapers have existed, here and abroad.

There is nothing disreputable about it. And, as far as we know at this point, nothing illegal.

Without good sources no newspaper could uncover scandals in the public interest.

Certainly, the world would never have learned about the expenses scandal that landed so many politicians in jail.

Which brings us to a sensitive domestic issue within the News International “family” which we cannot ignore.

It is absolutely right the company co-operates with police on inquiries ranging from phone and computer hacking to illegal payments.

We are right to hand over any evidence — emails, expense claims, memos — that might aid those inquiries.

It is right that those inquiries are carried out separately from the journalists under investigation. Nobody on The Sun was aware in advance that ten colleagues were about to be nabbed.

It is also important our parent company, News Corp, protects its reputation in the United States and the interests of its shareholders. But some of the greatest legends in Fleet Street have been held, at least on the basis of evidence so far revealed, for simply doing their jobs as journalists on behalf of the company.

Meanwhile, a huge operation driven by politicians threatens the very foundations of a free Press.

We have three separate police inquiries — Elveden, Weeting and Tuleta.

There is a Parliamentary inquiry and of course the free-ranging Leveson Inquiry into newspaper practices.

The field is open to almost anyone with a grievance to deliver their two cents’ worth, even touching unrelated issues such as Page Three.

The process, costing tens of millions of pounds, threatens to roll on for at least another year and probably two.

Interestingly, nothing on this scale is envisaged for the banking industry which has brought the nation to the brink of bankruptcy.

Before it is too late, should we not be asking where all this is likely to lead? Will we have a better Press?

Or a Press that has been bullied by politicians into delivering what they, not the readers, think fit?

The Oscar for stunts being awarded for;;

“These stories sometimes involve whistleblowers. Sometimes money changes hands. This has been standard procedure as long as newspapers have existed, here and abroad.

There is nothing disreputable about it. And, as far as we know at this point, nothing illegal.”

Nothing illegal?

Er paying the police for information IS illegal!

Someone had better tell Nick Ferrari of LBC, who earlier this week, admitted to doing this…

Fancy that!

Note to Guardian, BBC haters…

Corruption is corruption, no matter if it is left or right wing, or straight down the middle…

Anyone know whose making all the bullets and Kalashnikovs, because I’m sure the demand is going hot and the shares must be a good punt.
Depression, so I’m informed ,is inverted anger and if you add all the ‘angrys’ to all the ‘depressed’ who could revert to anger, there’s one hell of a party brewing.